Book review: Ah, youth. What a mess it can be. Maybe it should be, so we oldies have some compensation when we gaze upon those freshly fledged human specimens with their glossy, unwrinkled skin and matching brains.
Avi Duckor-Jones’ first novel (the Waiheke-based writer had a well-received shorter work, Swim, published six years ago) is crammed with the testosterone and torments of being 18 or so. On the opening page of Max, two lads enduring their last days of school blat along in one of their dads’ cars to dawn and the surf. You’ve got much of the eponymous protagonist’s world right there, with a bit of endearing sex involving sweet Sam(antha), and an authentically awful bottle party at the beach soon to follow.
But Max isn’t just a jock. You’re immediately drawn to him. Who could resist “There is a lot about myself I don’t necessarily like or understand, but I am proud of my feet”? He’s proud of his (adoptive) parents, too, an uncommon, welcome note in any fiction about young males. He’s hormone-harried, brimming with energy and uncertainty, convincingly self-obsessed, unstoppable and vulnerable. He’s the guts of the novel, and a real success.
He’s also in search of his identity. Nothing unusual there for a late adolescent, but in Max’s case, it involves sexual identity as well as personal trajectory and birth parents. He has always been an observer, a tentative participant: “I can’t give too much of myself to anybody.”
Finding what/how/when to give brings mistakes in a hotel room. It also takes him to New York, where lives Busby of the red dragon dressing gown and commendable compassion. He meets his ex-folksinger, substance-damaged mother and learns how to make real salad. Back near home, he also runs into birth-dad Pete, the prodigal artist. Via a couple of theatrical punch-ups and gratuitous model rhino smashing, he escapes to the Far North, where there’s a reunion, plus a pleasingly positive if marginally preachy ending in which love and painting seem likely to triumph.
So it’s a full life, trampolining between practice for adulthood and the last of childhood. Duckor-Jones gets his teen-speak spot on; knows that “you dick” can mean affection. He builds some punchy scenes of riot and power – the charismatic Fletch galvanises things every time he appears, don’t miss his end-of-year drama presentation. The kids are authentically ruthless, precarious, desperate to have the right body image and show cool where it matters – ie, everywhere. You’ll ache more than a bit for Sam.
Sometimes, the young characters seem strangely older and Max sounds like a 30-ish junior executive: “Mitigate the perceptions … the intricate vascular system of the train … this prequel to my life”. But okay, he’s trying out language as well as life.
The author is trying things out as well: it’s a potent, very conscious style – two-word sentences, insistent images (though the visionary cliffs that recur through the story are very effective), abundant adjectives. But you’re soon engrossed, you’re almost always convinced, and you’ll be pleased that our leading lad ends up buoyant. And, oh, I’m so relieved to be at the Gold Card stage of life.
